Therapeutic medical appliances are devices that are inserted into a vessel or passage to keep the lumen open and prevent closure due to a stricture, external compression, or internal obstruction. In particular, therapeutic medical appliances are commonly used to keep blood vessels open in the coronary arteries and they are frequently inserted into the ureters to maintain drainage from the kidneys, the bile duct for pancreatic cancer or cholangiocarcinoma or the esophagus for strictures or cancer. Vascular as well as not vascular therapeutic medical applianceing has evolved significantly; unfortunately there remain significant limitations with respect to the technology for producing therapeutic medical appliances suitable to various portions of a patient's anatomy.
Unfortunately, because of the topology of the human lungs generally and the various lobes in particular, traditional therapeutic medical applianceing is not effective in the treatment of pulmonary blebs and/or diffused destructive parenchymal disease. In most cases, attempts are made to section off lung tissue, which generally results in fluid retention and concomitant complications. Even if there was a way to deliver a therapeutic medical appliance to one bleb, it would require multiple procedures to address the common presence of multiple blebs.
Physicians have attempted to improve lung function in patients with emphysema by utilizing lung volume reduction procedures. The principal behind such procedures is that if the increased residual volume created by the bullous of disease could be reduced, the patients' respiratory limitations could be alleviated. Lung volume reduction procedures are very invasive and are only available to a minority of emphysema patients and require significant post surgical care and rehabilitation. Alternative systems have attempted to install valve systems that allow for the alleviation of respiratory limitations by closing blebs without the undesirable back filling of the closed areas. Regrettably, the valve system has a relatively short useful life, and therefore limited applicability, since patients with emphysema also have chronic bronchitis and thus lots of secretions in their airways to obstruct the valves. Moreover, placement of these valves requires invasive procedures as well.
Therefore there remains a need for a therapeutic medical appliance that can be placed in the segmental airways so as to reduce the residual volume and improve ventilation in a less invasive manner. Chiefly, there remains an existing need for a device and delivery method for installing the device in the lungs of a patient to treat pulmonary blebs or other suitable abnormalities. In particular, there is a need for a specialized therapeutic medical appliance designed to plug fissures or other abnormal anatomical openings. Moreover, there is an existing need for an interventional technique that allows for the delivery of multiple therapeutic medical appliances during a single procedure, without having to remove the delivery device. A need also remains for a delivery device that can be reloaded with a plurality of therapeutic medical appliances. There also remains a need for a method of treating pulmonary blebs that prevents disease recurrence in, aggravation and/or deterioration of the patient's pulmonary health.